Destiny And Humanity:Confucian Understanding And Response To Moral Luck

How to get an ethical good life in an uncertain world? Modern Moral Philosophy has attempted to find deterministic answers at the theoretical level in a way that ignores luck.However,the question of "Moral Luck" broke this illusion.This is an important link in the criticism of modern moral philosophy and the revival of virtue ethics to understand and deal with the influence of such uncertain factors as luck.When we think about moral luck from the perspective of Confucian ethics,it means that We can analyze the understanding of Confucian ethics about moral values and ethical life with the aid of "Moral Luck" filter.At the same time,we can also consider a series of questions,such as how to make theoretical qualitative analysis of Confucian ethics,and what contribution Confucian ethics can make to contemporary ethical research.The current research on moral luck mainly follows two approaches developed by Bernard Williams and Thomas Nagel.Williams emphasized the importance of thinking about luck from the perspective of the wholeness of ethical life and the pursuit of a good life in uncertainty,which leads to the discussion of virtue ethics.Nagel,on the premise of ensuring the primacy of rational agency in moral judgment,brought luck into the modern moral philosophy system as a factor that only affects judgment at the quantitative level,so to alleviate the contradiction between theory and practice in modern moral philosophy.Under the framework of the concept of "Destiny(Ming)and Humanity(Ren)" in Confucian ethics,the above two approaches may be unified to some extent.The multiplicity of "Destiny" not only contains the omnipresence of luck,but also indicates the innate origin of morality and luck.The latter resolves the paradox of moral luck from the aspect of Genetics.Humanity not only has agency and normative meanings,but also points to the whole ethical thinking about how to be human and how to live.In the dynamic balance between " Destiny" and "Humanity",Confucianism comprehensively investigated the moral significance of luck,and gave the corresponding path to realize good ethical existence in the uncertainty.